


This Day, Our Daily Bread

by Lisbetadair



Category: Call of Duty (Video Games)
Genre: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-19
Updated: 2018-02-11
Packaged: 2019-03-16 23:50:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13647000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lisbetadair/pseuds/Lisbetadair
Summary: A retelling of the early missions of Modern Warfare 2, from the perspective of Soap MacTavish.I use this to work through writer's block on other things, because the plot is right there for me.





	1. Chapter 1

** Chapter One **

 

_“Dad?”_

_“Mm?”_

_“How fast does it go?”_

_“I don't know, son. Ask Jim when we get there.”_

_“How does it work?”_

_Angus MacTavish laughed. He turned to the boy, stretched out on the back seat, and watched him spin the rotors of his toy helicopter round slowly with his fingers. “You can't do it fast enough. It goes faster than that!”_

_“How fast?”_

_“You'll see it soon enough.”_

“Iain?” 

MacTavish shook himself awake. “Is this us?” 

The driver laughed. “No. The boy's hungry” She slapped the dashboard. “Fair guzzles up the petrol. He's a greedy bastard. Do you want anything from the shop?”

He shook his head. In the distance, he could hear the roar of the motorway traffic. Rubbing the condensation from the glass, he saw that they were in the forecourt of a service station. Outside the pool of light, dawn was breaking, casting a limp, grey light over the damp hills. They had been on the road all night, winding their way across the country. He didn't know the brief yet, but today's destination: a submarine base snuggled in the Firth of Clyde, spoke volumes.

Outside, he stretched. The air was tinged with the odour of fuel, but he was grateful for it anyway. It was cold and it was fresher than the stale atmosphere he would be spending the next few days in. He _hated_ subs. He could see Ghost already on the grass beyond the forecourt, his collar turned up against the cold, puffing away on a cigarette like it was all that was keeping him alive.

It was already fading. He hadn't dreamed of his father in years and he wondered if this was a bad omen: to dream of the dead before a job. Either way, it didn't make him feel better. He tried to recall the trip, but now that he was awake it was a distant blur: just the faint outlines of voices and the stench of kerosene. He was forgetting more and more. He felt old.

Behind him, he heard the van rock as the driver jumped in and slammed the door shut behind her. He took one last deep breath, nodded to Ghost to hurry up, and climbed back inside.

 

 

 

“Seems we're headed the wrong direction, Sir. Shouldn't we be coming back to the fight?”

The face of General Shepherd filled the screen. He was several thousand miles away, beamed through a black satellite network that they were sure the Russians hadn't cracked. He laughed.

“Plenty of fight to go around, MacTavish. Glad you made it out of South America. You're meeting up with the 6th Fleet. Leading the counter-strike.”

MacTavish felt a hand at his elbow. A young aide proffered an expensive looking tablet computer. It was heavy and smooth in his hand, springing to life immediately and streaming data.

“Prisoner Six-Two-Seven. We believe that's who Makarov's got the mad-on for. But we can't get to him.” said Shepherd.

The information provided was surprisingly sparse. Intelligence reports from Ultranationalist defectors who talked of a foreign spy that Makarov had more than one expensive altercation with. Snippets of paperwork showing false names, fingerprints, but tantalisingly, no photograph. He frowned, thinking this was a little odd, and then the screen changed, showing a map of the East coast of Russia briefly and then an image that struck a bolt of fear through his heart.

“Oil rigs, sir?” said MacTavish, trying to control the waver in his voice.

“Russians are using them as SAM sites. Oil workers are human shields so we can't just blow up the rigs wholesale. And this one is the least defended. Boys, I know I'm sending you into the meat grinder in this one... “

“They're defending it,” MacTavish cut him off “So it means we want it. Especially if it gets us to Six-Two-Seven.”

 

 

 

Outside, MacTavish steadied himself against the wall. He pulled the squashed packet of cigars from his coat pocket and, his fingers shaking, cut and lit one.

 _The rigs. It had to be fucking rigs._ He sucked deeply on the end of the cigar, filling his lungs with its sweet, smooth smoke. He closed his eyes, but his mind was filled with the single, stark image of boiling flame pouring from the crippled pumping station.

“Sir?” He turned at the sound. Ghost was standing behind him, looking sheepish. He looked down at his feet and kicked a loose piece of render, sending it tumbling across the concrete. “You coming to the canteen? I fancy a bacon roll.”

“Aye. I'll be there in a minute.”

Ghost scuffed his boot into the ground and then looked at him, a worried frown on his face. “Are you all right. I mean, with the whole-”

“I'm fine.” MacTavish interrupted. “You don't need to worry about me.”

Ghost nodded. An uncomfortable silence descended. He pursed his lips. “I'll... I'll see you then.”

MacTavish watched him turn and go, hunched with his hands in his pockets, trying to make himself smaller and more unobtrusive. He smiled. Ghost was over six feet tall and with his piercing blue eyes and neatly trimmed blonde hair, he looked like a Danish prince. It was ridiculous: he was cripplingly shy in conversation, but always first into danger in a fight. The fact that he was worried enough to bring up his concerns told MacTavish a lot more than he had said.

 _Piper Alpha._ There was something about the words, they had an almost musical quality when they came together, despite their strangeness. Even after the grief was over, even after twenty-five years, he still didn't like saying them aloud. _Fucking rigs_. He spat the butt of the cigar from his mouth and ground it under his heel before heading off in the direction that Ghost had taken, towards the warmth of the canteen.

 

 

_Authors notes: Iain is the Scottish form of John. Whilst John may be the given name, there are some people who use Iain in day-to-day life. Piper Alpha was a real industrial disaster in the North Sea: a huge fire after an explosion in a gas pumping station which killed 161 men in 1988._

 


	2. Chapter 2

** Chapter Two **

 

 

In the darkness of the missile bay, he could hear the sound of animated whispering and the occasional low giggle. He tried to ignore it, even though he felt like shouting at them to shut up. He didn't want to betray how anxious he was, and they were running silent.

He really did hate subs: the oppressive claustrophobia, the worrying knowledge that they couldn't actually _see_ where they were going made him nervous enough and the burden of noise reduction, lest some bat-eared Russian pinpoint their position on the basis a stray fart, added in a level of frustration he could barely tolerate. He had spent most of the last few hours pedalling nowhere on a tiny exercise bike that had been squirrelled into a corner, and for a while, it had expended enough nervous energy that he felt better. Now it was building again.

On top of this, he was genuinely worried about the mission objective: a risky job, with the added pressure of hostages. If it all went wrong, the Russians were sure to blame them for killing their own people: the rigs were owned by an Alaskan conglomerate, staffed with mostly American workers, ordinary men, men like his Dad. _Fuck. Don't think about it._

Automatically, he slid his hand underneath his sweater to touch the edge of the rosary that hung around his neck. MacTavish hadn't set foot inside a church since he was a teenager, after the gradual, slow realisation that for all his pious prayers and offerings, God hadn't given a shit about the fate of his old man, left to burn in his own private hell as the rig tore itself apart around him. The words echoed in his mind, distorted by the years that had passed. _Fruit of the loom._ He frowned; he was sure that wasn't right. He rolled the beads between his fingers, trying to remember how it went.

He had kept the rosary, not because of what it represented, but because of what it was. His father had used it as a sort of ward against evil and danger, not just a prayer abacus. _Fat lot of good it did him, in the end._ He sighed. He told himself he wore it to keep his mother quiet, as if St Peter was going to miss every other indiscretion in the event of him being in the queue for heaven, but the reality was that its familiarity calmed him, and it did no harm to hedge your bets, he thought.

Naturally, they had trained for this sort of scenario, but in the calm turquoise waters of the Gulf of Mexico, with the balmy tropical air surrounding them, it had been easier. He had been uneasy, but with enough strength of will, he'd been able to pretend it was just another ship, another industrial park. The Bering Strait was different. He saw the towers in the photographs Shepherd had produced, battered by the cold, grey seas in the storm and it pierced him, opening up space for a slew of memories. _Fucking rigs_. They looked like the metal beasts that had terrorised his dreams for years, belching oil and flame. He closed his eyes, and tried to concentrate on something, _anything_ else.

 

 

MacTavish jumped. Ghost was at his head, shaking him awake. 

“What? Is something happening?” said MacTavish, rubbing his eyes. Ghost's pale face looked down at him, his face like his namesake in the darkness.

“No.” Ghost whispered. “You were... dreaming.”

“What?”

“Yeah. You were making this sort of...  noise.”

MacTavish growled and pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to hide his embarrassment.

“Are you okay?” Ghost voice was barely audible. “I mean, with the r-”

“I'm _fine_.” snapped MacTavish, “I'm fine. Just get some rest”

Ghost looked away shyly, like he wanted to say something, but he seemed to think the better of it. He backed off, with one last worried glance, into the darkness.

_What the fuck is wrong with you?_ MacTavish asked himself as he walked towards the mess. He'd been dreaming about the rig, the same dream, the one he'd thought he'd finally seen the back of. _This is bad._ He thought. _To dream of the dead once: an unhappy coincidence, but twice?_

He needed something to concentrate on. The sub was abandoning them in a few hours, so they had packed light. Anything they would leave was probably not going to make it back to them. The plan was that they would take the rig and be evacuated by air, flying on to the ancient stone prison that held their true objective. He thought for a moment and then started to rummage in his bag. He found the cold metal of the pistol and pulled it out, examining it in the light.

It had been Price's legacy, albeit accidentally. He'd known he couldn't get the shot, so he'd slid it over for MacTavish to take, giving him the opportunity to blow Zakayev's brains all over the concrete. It had been too late for Price, but it had saved MacTavish's life. He wished he'd known Price better. He'd seemed like a good man, and, _Christ_ , he owed him his life a few times. _Always the good guys._

MacTavish had tried to ape his confidence when he'd received his commission, tried to be as strong as he remembered Price had been. _You wouldn't catch Price running scared._ He thought. _Probably just shrug it over and go re-wax his moustache._ MacTavish snorted and rubbed his hands over his two days of stubble. That was one area he wasn't prepared to emulate.

He'd no idea where it came from. Weapons policy in Credenhill was lax to say the least. It could have been passed down to him by a retired friend, he could have found it in the kitchen being used as a door wedge. He ran his hands over the grip, feeling the smooth, worn parts where it had been held and fired countless times. He opened the slide, checking it was empty, and slid out the magazine. He'd cleaned and greased the gun before they'd left Faslane, but he wanted something to do. He started to strip it down, grateful for something to concentrate on.

Spring. Pin. Barrel. He looked at it, naked and dissembled in front of him. He shivered. It was cold and he was trying to warm himself around a mug of tea that had been left to stew so long it could be used to tar a street. _Jesus... Price._ He'd not thought about Price, not _really,_ thought about him for a few years. Sure, there was the What Would Price Do Question every so often, but he'd not thought about the time they'd served together for a while: The bridge, the third world hospital he'd slowly crept back to life in, the stony faced widows and their masks of grief, and furious little Rosie Price. He smiled.

_Christ, she really fucking hated her Dad!_ He thought. _Maybe I would have too if he'd fucked off to the arse end of the world regularly and never wrote, eternally disappointed by her absent Y chromosome._ She hadn't been Price, she'd kept her mother's name after the divorce. _What was it now? M... Mbaye_. _That was it._ He knew that she'd only done it because she was angry, but after six months with nothing but bald Russians too overweight and too old to fight changing his bandages, all the bets were off where a good fuck was concerned. Sure, he felt a bit guilty afterwards, when she'd started weeping into her coffee, but there had been no ill will between them. If there was an afterlife, he'd settle his scores then.

Price had always seemed to care about the men under his command, he'd been a genuinely good leader, so it had been a shock to hear Rosie's bitter vitriol, her smooth face furrowed with angry lines. She'd been angry, but she'd also been disappointed. _With Price? With herself?_ He'd never worked it out. _Perhaps you shouldn't have shagged her._..It seemed disrespectful now, as he slid together the pieces of Price's pistol. He'd never had to use it in combat, but it worked fine on the range. He suddenly had a mental image of a heavily armed Russian bearing down on him and the gun jamming, haunted by a furious Price, waiting for revenge on the man who'd used his death as a way to worm his way into his daughter's bed.

“Yeah. Well she was pretty up for it.” he said aloud, spinning the pistol around on his finger, and then he realised he was sitting alone, talking to a pistol that he was worried might be possessed. _You've finally fucking cracked!_ He thought, smiling for the first time that day.

 


	3. Chapter 3

 

** Chapter 3 **

** **

MacTavish had dived before, but a dip in a flooded quarry, he now realised, did not prepare you for the real thing, out in the wild dark of the Arctic sea. He thought he'd feel better in the open, but he was wrong. The inky blackness of the ocean closed oppressively around them. He made the mistake of looking down, into the nothingness that stretched between him and the ocean floor, thousands of feet away.

The iceberg concealing the sub from prying Russian sonar loomed large above them. _Christ. It's fucking freezing!_ He thought. He'd tried to prepare for the cold, icy water, but no amount of mental steadfastness could keep out the numbing chill. Normally, he wouldn't have second thoughts about pissing himself just for the welcoming layer of warmth in the suit, but the fear was gripping him too hard to relax anything. Ahead was the rig: the nightmare and around him was an cold, alien world. He could feel his heart beating in his chest, radiating up to his throat. It make the suit feel suddenly constricting and uncomfortable around his neck.

He jerked at a terrible noise: a mournful, shuddering cry that sent a spasm of terror coursing through his body. For a brief moment he thought it was the rig come to life and then he realised: it was a whale. _Fucking hell!_ He snorted into his respirator, feeling like an idiot. The noise came again, booming and rolling over him. He'd no idea it would be so loud, or sound so terrible. He laughed, exploding bubbles across his vision.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw movement and twisted round. For a moment he thought it was the whale, curious about the steel leviathan invading its territory, but then it resolved into a familiar shape: the Dallas. _Jesus. What a monster!_ Half submerged in Faslane, he hadn't appreciated the size of it. As he watched, it calved the submersibles of the second sub team: tiny infants compared to their behemoth mother. He signalled to them, indicating that everything was progressing as planned, glad of something normal to focus on.

A shoal of silver fish darted and flashed between the teams, twisting and turning between the currents. MacTavish had no idea what they were, but a brief fantasy of them fried and battered with chips flashed across his vision. He couldn't feel his toes any more. He followed their movement as they dived and dashed, weaving through the ice and suddenly it was there in front of them, the massive steel struts supporting it looming out of the dark. MacTavish felt a rush of fear and suppressed it. He waited a few seconds, concentrating on his breathing and then turned to signal to the others to detach. He pushed away from the submersible and up, towards the light.

Breaching the surface silently, he looked briefly out over the still ocean. The sun was rising, a thin orange haze filling the sky. The day was clear and still. He could see more icebergs in the distance, floating far out beyond the other rigs. They flashed and sparkled in the sunlight. He didn't look at the other stations. If he didn't think about it too much, he could pretend he was doing something else.

He looked up. They'd come up under the lowest level of the platform. The pump lines had been retracted in case of sabotage, and presumably because the workers had more pressing concerns at the moment. Above them, two lonely Russians paced the deck. One of them pulled a cigarette from his mouth, blowing fat plumes of smoke from his nose. His colleague spoke in rapid Russian that MacTavish couldn't follow. They hadn't been spotted.

He looked across the water and could see Roach's head bobbing. He felt for the knife strapped to his shoulder and slid it free from its sheath. Above him the two Russians were talking, still oblivious. There was no other way to get past without killing them, and from his synchronised watch, he knew they would need to radio in again in half an hour.

“We'll take them out together.” He whispered. “On your go.”

Roach gave him the thumbs up and then he was out of the water like lightening, pulling himself up single handed against the edge of the deck and grabbing the guard by his belt. MacTavish kicked his fins and did likewise, the guard toppling over and landing backwards into the water, his yell silenced by the sudden cold. MacTavish stabbed down, the blade slicing across his throat. Suddenly he was immersed in a plume of hot blood as the knife hit its target, laying open the great vessels. The guard thrashed for a moment, his eyes wide with surprise and then he went limp, the cold and the shock doing their work. MacTavish looked into his eyes and felt nothing. He watched the body fall, lifeless, into the black.

_Better you than me._ He thought as the figure disappeared. He reached up and hauled himself from the water, stripping off the fins, mask and tank quickly. If they were successful on the mission, the support team would pick them up later. If they weren't, then it wasn't his problem. _Jesus! It's baltic!_ Despite the calm air, it was chillier outside the water than in it. He shivered. He nodded to Ghost who was already crouched by the foot of the stairs, ready. He was wearing a thick woollen balaclava with a printed skull emblazoned on the front and which MacTavish suffered because despite his eccentricities, Ghost was the first person he'd want covering his back.

MacTavish checked over the assault rifle, hefting its weight in his hands and took a few deep breaths. Even quiescence, the stench of petroleum filled the platform, its acrid tang hitting him in the back of the throat.

_The faint odour of sweat and oil. His dirty boiler suits littering the kitchen floor. The sports bag he carried empty and discarded by the door._

The memory punched him hard in the chest. He stopped, his hand resting on the gun, looking at the gridded deck. He looked up, blinking in the brightening dawn light. He couldn't see them, but the rig workers were up in the belly of the platform, human shields against the might of the allied air force. He suddenly felt furious. _Wee kiddies, waiting for their Dads to come home. Mum crying into her tea, waiting for news. Wishing just for the kitchen to be filled with dirty clothes and the stench of oil._ He hawked the saliva in his throat and spat onto the deck. _Fuck this!_ He thought. _Hostages?_ _How fucking low did you have to be?_

MacTavish clenched his jaw, breathing heavily. He was really annoyed now. _You cunts want to play dirty?_ He thought. _Aye. Well. We'll soon see about that!_

“Two hostiles down in section One-Alpha. Moving up to section Two.” He radioed back to the team.

“Roger that, Hotel Six.”

MacTavish stood up. “Keep it tight people.” He nodded to Ghost, who nodded silently in reply. Around him the men looked up expectantly, waiting for the command. He could feel the palpable tension. “Ready weapons.” A flurry of hands stroking across metal, faint clicks hidden by the waves lapping.

He hefted the rifle and took a deep breath. “Move up.”

The hunt had started.


	4. Chapter 4

** Chapter 4 **

****

MacTavish crept up the stairs into the main body of rig, moving smoothly and silently, careful to avoid any patches of ice that would send him flying. _It would be shit luck to break a leg because Ivan was too bone idle to grit the deck_. He thought

“Keep it tight, people.” He reminded, but it was superfluous. Behind him the rest of the pack followed. He felt a touch of pride at the near-absence of noise as the climbed. They had practised and practised until they functioned like an oiled machine, sliding through the shadows like the touch of death itself.

The entrance to the first deck was obscured behind a tank of some kind, protected by a mesh enclosure. There were warning signs plastered across it. MacTavish shuddered. He didn't need any reminders that a misplaced round would convert the drilling platform into a fiery grave. His memory vomited an image from an ancient newsreel: the black smoke, the hellish fire. He shook himself and pushed it away.

“Got a visual by the railing.” said Ghost.

MacTavish signalled for the team to hold and scurried to the end of the tank. Peeking round carefully he could see a single sentry, obviously paying no attention, preferring instead to take the opportunity for a sly smoke, despite the extensive warnings not too. _Jesus! What a fucking moron!_ He thought.

“Free to engage, suppressed weapons only” he replied, beckoning over his shoulder. Roach slid past him and took aim. There was muffled crack, which echoed despite the silencing, and the sentry tumbled over the rail.

“We're clear.” said Ghost.

 MacTavish didn't look to see where the guard landed, but a glance over the railing gave him a shock. _Fuck!_ The position had a clear view down to the lower deck and it was a miracle they'd not been spotted. _Too fucking close_. He wasn't happy. _Stupid fucking mistake. Should have looked up when I got out the water. Fuck!_ He felt fear like a knife in his belly and gritted his teeth, steeling against it.

A voice over the radio jolted him back to the present. “Civilian hostages at your position: watch your fire.”

_Right. Got a job to do!_ He moved forward, up the short staircase onto the next landing. There were two doors ahead, and he remembered from the plan that they led into some kind of maintenance area, something to do with the drill lines. The intelligence had suggested the hostages were split into several groups, and the satellite images had shown the guards bringing them down towards the lower decks. They hadn't been seen since. If they weren't here, they'd already been executed, so his heart lifted when he saw shadows moving around behind the frosted glass. The intel was spot on. He nodded to Roach.

“Roger that. Team One moving to breach.”

Roach didn't need telling twice. He pulled the frame charge out and smoothly, barely making a sound, pressed it to to the door. Stepping back, he nodded to MacTavish and hit the detonator.

The door exploded, vanishing into a blizzard of wooden splinters. MacTavish blinked as a warm backflash rolled over him, his lungs filling with the acrid, choking fumes, the booming sound of the explosion loud in the enclosed space of the metal deck. He held his breath and dived through.

Roach was already ahead of him, his weapon braced on his shoulder, taking aim at the closest soldier. The Russians were in complete disarray, caught half-asleep on their chairs. The nearest one had just got to his feet, and started reaching for his pistol when Roach squeezed a single round from the M14, aimed directly at his head. MacTavish watched it snap back, the guard's body arching back with the force of the bullet slamming through his skull. He spotted another lurking behind him, making for cover behind a table. MacTavish's reaction was automatic, a reflex. The stream of bullets hit the guard square in the chest and he dropped.

Around him, the shooting stopped. “Clear!” he shouted. All the visible Russians were on the floor, blood pooling around their still bodies. He glanced quickly at the hostages. He didn't want to look at them for too long; it was painful. They wore bright boiler suits, clearly not have been given any chance to change during the siege of the rig. At least over the acrid stink over the explosives he couldn't smell the inevitable stench of human suffering.

They were restless, whining and crying through their gags. _Probably scared out of their fucking minds._ The man nearest his feet had slumped onto his side, whimpering. MacTavish could see the old blood crusting on his face, a dried red smear across his neck that stained his collar. He was blindfolded, so at least he didn't have to look him in the eye.

His jaw clenched. _Someone's going to fucking pay for this!_ He thought, grimly. 

“Hostages secured in section two-echo.” He said, alerting the coordinators back at the support ship.

“Roger that, Hotel Six. Team two will secure and evac, continue your search topside.”

“Okay. Move upstairs.” He looked round at Roach, and jerked his head towards the doorway. “Control, we're advancing to deck two.” The team fell in behind him “Eyes open.” He reminded. “Watch your sectors.”

MacTavish jogged up the stairs. Even though the rig wasn't pumping, the machinery was still running. The intel had suggested that the noise would be loud enough to cover the sound of the frame charge from any alert ears on the deck above, and they'd been right. Despite it being to their advantage, he didn't like it. He wanted it silent, and dead.

The stairs led outside, and there were no guards. The satellite images had shown them how often the patrols happened, and he suspected that for the most part, the Russians were holed up in the accommodation, trying to keep warm.

“Enemy helo patrolling the perimeter, keep a low profile.”

He scanned the sky and then he heard it, the low thump of the rotors coming closer.

“Enemy helo. Get out of sight.” He snapped at the team.

The noise increased and then he saw it, swooping along the side of the rig in front of them, its searchlight beam playing across the wall. He ducked behind the railing where a piece of sheet metal had been left to rest. The thump of the rotors came closer and then it was gone, sweeping past them. He exhaled. _Routine patrol, or do they suspect something's up?_ He had a bad feeling that their presence was not going to go unnoticed for long. The best of all possible outcomes involved getting to the accommodation block unnoticed and then team two could at least back them up in the eventual fire fight after the hostages were secure. MacTavish didn't like the idea of going loud before they were all accounted for: some of them might end up caught in the crossfire.

He signalled to the team to move on. The radio crackled, informing him that they were getting close to the location of the second batch of hostages. Out in the open again it was freezing again. A stiff breeze had sprung up, caressing his face with its icy touch. He shivered. His ears burned painfully in the cold and he mentally kicked himself for forgetting his hat. Peaking round the corner, he could see that the deck was clear ahead. He knew that the patrol wasn't due for another fifteen minutes, enough time for them to do their work. He signalled to Roach to move up towards the door ahead.

Looking round, he noticed that propped against the railing was a Stinger launcher. _So, the Russians had been expecting visitors._ He was pleased to see they'd misguidedly focussed on the air rather than the water. Plus, if the helicopter came round for a second look, at least they had some way of dealing with it should things heat up. He regretting not holding out for their own kit, but everything had been transferred out to other active units. The Americans had been keen to buy, but the cupboard in Hereford was bare.

As he stared at the Stinger, he realised he could hear the sound of the waves beneath them, lapping at the struts supporting the rig. _Not good._ The brains in Langley had insisted the noise of the rig, even inactive, would cover the sound of the breaching charges, but outside, without the echoing walls, it was a lot quieter. _Shit_.

He knew there was no other way of doing it: they'd run the situation over and over again. The only way to be sure of surprising the Russians and getting the hostages to safety was to take both doors out at once with a simultaneous breech. They couldn't just knock, and these were hefty fireproof doors, designed to provide some sort of protective in the event of things MacTavish didn't want to think about. They couldn't just been staved in with a kick. _Fuck_. He had no choice.


End file.
